I was driving the other day and I passed a big semi-truck that had giant spikes on the wheels. I can’t quite understand what the point of such things is. Is the idea to provide an incentive for people not to crash into the giant truck? If so, I think it’s redundant. Maybe it’s in case they get into a race with Ben-Hur?
Are there any truckers out there who can explain what these things are to me?
UPDATE: Did some searching. Here is a post with a picture of a similarly-outfitted truck. The author of the post seems to share my sentiments. According to some of the comments, the spikes are plastic. Well, I’m sure that’s what Messala said to Ben-Hur, too.
UPDATE II: Nearly three years later, this is inexplicably the most popular post I’ve ever done, by far. Apparently, lots of other people had this question too. Well, hope you enjoy the blog and while you’re here, check out my book. There’s nothing about semi-truck wheel spikes in it though, I’m afraid.
Over at the Buffalo Bills fanblog “Buffalo Rumblings“, Aaron Lowinger wrote a counter-factual season preview/review of past Bills seasons; that is, a kind of historical fiction or “alternate reality” type of post. I thought it was a cool idea, but the reaction from most of the site’s readers was pretty negative. I can sort of see why, too, because even in Lowinger’s fantastic universe, the Bills are still seeking their first championship. Enhanced misery is not what people want in their daydreams.
I really like the idea, though. I’d like to try it myself in fact. Allow me, if I may, to borrow Lowinger’s (and Buffalo Rumblings editor Brian Galliford’s) idea, and try to make it into a happier one. What follows is purely fictional–although it may be factual somewhere in the multiverse…
****
When the ball slipped through the fingers of their most reliable receiver this past January, it shattered many Bills fans’ hopes of doing something done only twice before: three championships in four years. The Bills, coming off a franchise-best 14-2 regular-season record, had marched down the field for a touchdown to cut the upstart Jaguars’ lead to 31-29, but the two-point conversion fell short with only seconds remaining.
It was a rare miscue for a team accustomed to winning. After their thrilling 31-28 O.T. win over Arizona in SB 43, the Bills had established a reputation as clutch winners. Their improbable run to a 34-15 shellacking of that same Arizona team in SB 45 only cemented that reputation, with a thrilling 17-point rally to beat Indy in the divisional round, followed by Trent Edwards’ clutch drive to down favored Baltimore 27-24 in the conference final being the most notable examples.
January’s disappointment aside, the Bills remain a young team with all the major pieces in place for another championship run.Although they lost star running back Steven Jackson in free-agency, they are confident that Spiller can fill his shoes. The receiving corps remains intact, as does the offensive line. The addition of Asante Samuel to a strong secondary makes them arguably even more powerful than the #2 defensive unit that led them to their first championship.
****
Well, that was fun, right? Or maybe not. Is it just a sad reminder of how bad things are, or an uplifting diversion? For, after all, sports themselves are meant to be an uplifting diversion. They really aren’t much good if you let them make you sad.
P.S. Lowinger and Galliford–should you happen to read this, I hope you don’t mind me reworking your idea. If you do, I’ll gladly take it down. It’s not exactly Goethe reworking Marlowe’s stuff, but sometimes it pays to take more than one crack at an idea.
Was it really this easy to start a mob rampage in the ’40s?
I’ve been watching the “Universal Monsters” movies on TV lately. It’s a Mystery Science Theater 3000-like comedy show called “Svengoolie“, but for the most part the comic interruptions do little to either enhance or detract from the film.
It is rather amusing how all the movies follow the same basic templates, but it kind of makes sense once you remember these movies were made in the 1930s and ’40s and it must have been a treat just to get to see a movie, even if it was almost the same as the previous movie. People were probably less critical of movies then.
It’s also hilarious how often a torch-wielding mob shows up in these flicks. There’s a scene in The Mummy’s Tomb where the Sheriff or somebody says to the assembled townspeople: “You’re not gonna believe this, but there’s a 3000 year-old monster on the loose. We’ve got to run him down.” (Close paraphrase.) The next scene is a mob of people marching to the cemetery with torches, on the grounds that somebody saw an Egyptian guy there the other day.
I never liked the Mummy movies; he moves hilariously slow. And the plot is just too sloppy and incoherent, even by horror movie standards. The only Mummy movie I ever liked was the 1999 one, which wasn’t even a horror movie, but a very amusing action-adventure.
Now, the Dracula movies were much better, even if they were also very predictable. But Dracula seemed like a dangerous monster, what with the turning into a bat and a wolf and magically opening locked doors and whatnot.
One other note: The Mummy’s Tomb has a character in it who looks exactly like Ron Paul. At least, I thought he did. (I admit I tend to see resemblances to people in movie characters very often, and my fellow viewers don’t know what I’m talking about. It’s like the TMBG song “Certain People I Could Name“.) That was perhaps the most frightening thing in the whole movie. The actor’s name, by the way, was Otto Hoffman.
These aren’t the funniest, but it’s strangely satisfying to vent at them:
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Beats me, but if robots who want to sell me real estate can figure it out, it can’t be that hard.
Check out this BuzzFeed article about a Scholastic Books series called Survive Anything! The article claims that the books are “misogynistic” because there is an edition for boys and an edition for girls. The boys’ edition teaches things like “How to Survive a Tornado”, “How to Survive a Broken Leg” and, perhaps least usefully, “How to Survive a T-Rex”. (Oughtn’t they at least teach how to survive time-travel first?) The girls’ edition, on the other hand, teaches stuff like “How to survive a BFF Fight”, “How to Show You’re Sorry” and “Top Tips for Speechmaking”.
This, the writer at BuzzFeed says, is not right. Why do girls get tips on emotional, domestic-type stuff when boys get tips on how to survive in the wild?
Well, I agree it’s not right, of course. But I don’t think it’s misogynistic. It’s really just sexist. But if you must use a stronger term, it’s misandrist. Surviving a tornado is a useful skill, although frankly, unless you already have tornado shelter built, it’s purely a matter of luck. Most of the Indiana Jones-like scenarios the boys’ version seems to cover are situations that (a) probably will never happen and (b) would be decided mostly by chance if they did happen.
The girls edition teaches all sorts of things that might actually occur. I’m a man, and I’ve never needed to know how to survive my parachute failing, but I have had to give speeches and say “I’m sorry” for things. But these books merely assume that men would never be concerned with such things. Well, enough of that prejudiced thinking, say I! I resent the notion that we fellas are only good for feats of brute strength and endurance, and that the civilized arts of diplomacy are closed to us!
“Gentlemen, this is a football.” Thus did the famous coach Vince Lombardi supposedly begin every first team meeting of the season, while holding up same. The point being, you always start off with the basics. However, I don’t know about the AIFA; some of their players might be seeing a football for the first time.
The other day, somebody got to this blog by searching for the terms “how would max weber view american football”. I don’t know if he was even thinking of the same Max Weber I’m so fond of, but regardless, I thought to myself: “Heck, I would like to read that article.” So, here is a cursory attempt at writing it.
Of course, it’s hard to figure out the answer without a Ouija board and some arcane black magic. And even then, it would probably only be something simplistic like “the competitiveness reflects the Protestant ethic” or “the Browns are 6 and 10 this year, best case.”
I’m not too familiar with his most famous writings about religion; I’ve mostly studied Weber’s contributions to political thought. Long-time readers probably remember his three types of authority:
Charismatic authority
Traditional authority
Legal authority
Well, I suppose he’d think that coaches like Rex Ryan and players like Tim Tebow have charismatic authority, whereas coaches like Belichick and players like Ray Lewis rely on a sort of traditional authority–they have enjoyed a lot of success, so people are supposed to automatically respect them. The equivalent to Legal authority is, well, the referees and the commissioner. (As the Saints are discovering.)
I once saw an NFL Films show about the Pittsburgh Steelers championship run in 2005. It started off with this quasi-hymn or chant-like music that sounded religious and very eerie all at once. Imagine “Duel of the Fates“, only way creepier. It seemed pretty serious for a bunch of football highlights. But there are people who definitely see football as nearly as important. (Another Lombardi line, of which there are some variations: “All that matters is your God, your family and the Green Bay Packers”.)
Still, Weber studied religions as a way of highlighting differences in cultures and people’s philosophies. The superficial resemblance of sports fanatics to religious fanatics is obviously more about the features of fanaticism than religion. So we’re still at a dead end.
Let’s approach this from a different direction: we know that American football, though wildly popular in the United States, is not the number one sport in any other country. Perhaps the reasons for this are tied to “American exceptionalism”. But this is more Tocqueville than it is Weber. (Where is that Ouija board?) And unfortunately, I cannot find much that Weber had to say about America.
So once again, I am frustrated. I leave it to you, blogosphere and distinguished commenters, to sort this problem out. What would Max Weber think of American football?
If I were an architect, I think my work would be similar to that of the guy who designed the Leaning Tower of Pisa, except with the signature angle accentuated a bit more. That is to say, it would be the “Giant Pile of Rubble of Pisa.”
I am not skilled in this field. My concept of a building is not complex. My design philosophy is perhaps best represented by this diagram:
I guess there would also be a floor of some sort.
Seriously, that’s it. Even the LEGO buildings that I made as a kid looked about like this. The everyday triangular roof is a tricky concept for me. And just forget about anything with curves! Whenever I see a building with curves, it freaks me out; how do they do that?
I’ve mentioned before my pathetic ignorance of this art. But I’ve been trying to remedy it by reading as much as I can about architectural styles, philosophies, techniques etc. I’m pleased to report that I’ve learned some stuff.
So far, I’d say that the closest thing to my “style” I’ve seen is the one called “Brutalism“:
Buffalo City Court Building, an example of “Brutalist architecture. From Wikipedia, by user “Fortunate4now”
I like this style. There’s none of this “working with the landscape”. It seems to say “See this? It’s a building. That’s right, a big freakin’ block for people to go inside of.” Oh, sure, it’s ugly. But if I were designing buildings, I’d be concerned mostly with making sure the thing was really solid more than I would be with looks. I wouldn’t want to be remembered as “the guy whose beautiful building collapsed when a stiff breeze came up at the grand opening”. Maybe I’m too risk averse for this stuff.
Another thing I’ve discovered is about how I learn things. Some people are “visual” learners: they need to see a picture to understand a concept. Other people are more abstract, learning stuff by reading about it. And some people, like me, need both pictures and words–usually several times–before they understand stuff.
If I just read a description of, for instance, Art Nouveau, I can’t picture it in my mind at all. And if I just see a picture of it, I have no idea what about it makes it distinct from, say, Art Deco. I have to pretty much carefully read a description of an instance of the one style, while looking at a picture, and then do the same for the other. It doesn’t come naturally at all. I think I’ve finally got it, though: AD tends to have more lines, AN tends to have more curves.
So far, that’s what I’ve learned. If I become an expert in the field, I’ll be sure to report back. Although I doubt you can do that just by reading Wikipedia…
I think football is on its way out, frankly. Hockey and basketball, too. Even baseball’s days are numbered. Safety is only part of the reason. The other part can be seen by watching these two clips:
That’s a game from 1991. Now here is the first gameplay video for Madden 13, which will come out this August:
It’s a big difference. Meanwhile, real-world football is still the same as it was in 1991. Sure, the equipment is a little better, but it’s still pretty similar.
“But,” you object, “there’s a ceiling on how much the game can improve. The best it can do is look just like the real thing, and it doesn’t even do that yet. Besides, we need a real-life version game of football to provide a benchmark for what the video game should be like.”
I used to think that, too. But we have a benchmark, in the form of NFL films historical record. And the Madden games already include a mode in which you can play against virtual replicas of former football stars. People know who those guys are–and the thrill will be playing as your own team, with players named for you and your friends, going up against the ’72 Dolphins or the ’85 Bears.
More to the point, most fans don’t like all real football games. Sometimes, they are “boring”–that is, they are defensive struggles, as opposed to exciting, long-touchdown filled games. Most fans hate that. But video games can fix this problem–you can have 70-63 games if you like.
It goes without saying that you don’t get injured playing virtual football over the internet. Out of shape, maybe, but not “injured”. The celebrities of football will no longer be the athletes, but people who are unbeatable at the virtual game. And the best part is, way more people can play a video game than can play actual, pro-level football.
We’re already most of the way there. This is where the safety concerns really come into play, because soon, no one will like the actual sport–too much danger. The video games will provide something for all the football experts to go into when the real game is too controversial. Imagine what it would be like to go up against some former player or coach in the video game–it will be incredibly popular.
The same thing will happen with all other sports, too. But I doubt anyone will miss them; they’re too much trouble. Video game sports are more accessible, safer, and can be played year-round.
The whole Springfield Gazette was one sheet of paper, and it was all about Lincoln. Only him. Other people only came into the document in conjunction with how he experienced life at that moment. If you look at the Gazette picture above, you can see his portrait in the upper left-hand corner… But just to the left of his picture, and above that column of text, is a little box. And in that box you see three things: his name, his address, and his profession (attorney).
The first column underneath his picture contains a bunch of short blurbs about what’s going on in his life at the moment – work he recently did, some books the family bought, and the new games his boys made up. In the next three columns he shares a quote he likes, two poems, and a short story about the Pilgrim Fathers…
Put all that together on one page and tell me what it looks like to you. Profile picture. Personal information. Status updates. Copied and shared material. A few longer posts. Looks like something we see every day, doesn’t it?
And it goes on:
Lincoln was requesting a patent for “The Gazette,” a system to “keep People aware of Others in the Town.” He laid out a plan where every town would have its own Gazette, named after the town itself… Lincoln was proposing that each town build a centrally located collection of documents where “every Man may have his own page, where he might discuss his Family, his Work, and his Various Endeavors.”
This right here should have tipped anyone who read this off that this was a hoax, by the way: the use of the word “page” sounds very odd here, not at all like someone from the 1800s would use it, and exactly like someone familiar with the internet would use it.
And surely it must have struck the people reading this that the concept is on its face absurd. People would have no need for such a tool back in the 1800s. They already had town newspapers. The faux-proposal sounds just stupid when you put it like this. This, again, should have given the whole thing away.
What this hoax exposed–perhaps unwittingly–is that Facebook is not a lot more useful than a town newspaper. It gives you some ability to stay in touch with your friends, but for the most part it’s just a time-waster. It’s addictive, sure, but not all that useful. It is barely more than a glorified bulletin board. or newspaper.
Lincoln invent Facebook! The idea is laughable at first sight!
